Heart And Heroism On The Newtown 911 Calls

EditorialThe Hartford Courant

The 911 calls from Sandy Hook Elementary School to Newtown police on that horrible day have finally been released. They reveal great courage.

These are remarkable tapes that speak to the professionalism of emergency personnel suddenly thrown into a nightmare taking place on what was supposed to be a quiet Friday morning just days before Christmas.

The calls do credit to Newtown officials, even as they remind remind listeners of the nightmare of that day last December. They show some of the best of human nature against a backdrop of evil.

The state judge who ordered them released over the resistance of town officials and the chief investigator into the massacre had warned that they were "harrowing and disturbing." But he argued that withholding them "only serves to fuel speculation about and undermine confidence in our law enforcement officials."

He was right. Their release is now having the opposite effect: They instill pride and confidence in the people who were caught in that terror.

Pride, for example, in the custodian who risked his life to help. Rick Thorne was captured on tape being the eyes and ears of the police during the tragedy.

Pride in the multitasking dispatchers who faced this inconceivable crisis with composure and sympathy for the people on the other end of the line. They reacted as if they'd spent their careers training for just this horror. One steadied his voice as he told a teacher whose own quivered with fright, "Keep everybody calm, keep everybody down, get everybody away from windows." One can only imagine the dispatcher's fear as well.

The word that springs to mind, over and over, in listening to the calls is "calm." In this extraordinary situation, dispatchers kept controlled. They asked about the children, counseled callers on keeping safe, reassured them that help was coming, even as their own heavy sighs could be heard at unguarded moments.

Superior Court Judge Eliot D. Prescott had predicted this with his ruling last week ordering the calls released: "Public analysis of the recordings may serve to vindicate and support the professionalism and bravery of the first responders on Dec. 14, 2012."

Yes, anguish can be heard on the calls as well. But the expectation was so much worse, given the town's resistance to releasing them. As the judge had said, the public was starting to wonder what Newtown officials were hiding. It turns out to be heart and heroism.

Wounds

The tapes can't help but cause emotional pain for the families of the 26 school victims who were gunned down by Adam Lanza. The families in their grief have the understanding of everyone. Sadly, however, the tapes won't be their last reminder of the losses caused by the unhinged gunman during his horrific shooting spree. Calls to the state police, for example, have yet to be released. They are pending a freedom-of-information request by the Associated Press.

These calls, meanwhile, make us wonder again what was there in them that led the chief investigator, Danbury State's Attorney Stephen J. Sedensky III, to fight so hard to keep them secret. Tapes of 911 calls are usually released upon request after such crimes. The Sandy Hook tapes are heart-rending because of the understandable terror in some of the voices. But they are not explicit.

And if the tapes had been released when first requested, the pain of reliving them would already have begun to recede.